Holiday Style

We spent Friday and Saturday in New York City taking in the many Christmas decorations, eating wonderful food (Lombardi's Pizza!), and seeing some amazing performances.

The ice skating rink and Christmas tree at Rockefeller Center.

I finally convinced David to go with me into the American Girl store. It was so sweet to see the little girls bringing their dolls excitedly to the store. I never had an American Girl doll but loved reading the Felicity books when I was younger, so she is my favorite.

Saint Patrick's Cathedral is just beautiful and had a wonderful feeling inside.

The nativity scene inside Saint Patrick's.

Every street is decked out with some holiday decoration of some sort, the nutcrackers on this street were a favorite of ours.

Friday afternoon we went to Radio City Music Hall to catch a showing of the Rockette's Christmas Spectacular. It was a really flashy, fun show. The Rockette's were so beautiful and the dancing was amazing. The show ended with a living nativity presentation which was very nice.

Inside Radio City Music Hall.

After the show we went to South Street Seaport and went to the Bodies Revealed exhibit, we then walked through the Financial District. The tree outside the New York Stock Exchange was beautiful. We met our great friends Robbie and Emily for pizza at Lombardi's which claims the distinction of being America's first pizzeria. It was DELICIOUS, we ate a ton. :)

Saturday started with a trip to the temple which looked lovely with wreaths decorating it.

We then went to the Metropolitan Opera House to see Il Trittico by Puccini. Our friend Tammy sings for the Met, and we loved seeing her perform. We were absolutely enthralled by the entire experience at the Met, it was so grand and beautiful. We loved it!

Outside the Opera House after the show, I couldn't stop smiling after seeing Gianni Schicchi (which O Mio Babbino Caro is from), it had us laughing so hard.

Merry and Bright

We fully feel the Christmas spirit following this weekend of holiday activities.

Friday night we went downtown to enjoy some of the sites:

The gingerbread house is modeled after the Yale Repertory Theatre, so cute!

Look how beautiful the tree on the Green is. We love New Haven!

We had a piece of Lithuanian coffee cake from Claire's Corner Copia. We had read in several local magazines that this coffee cake was the best and it lived up to the reviews! Yum!

Today we decorated our tree, watched It's A Wonderful Life, and sang in our stake's Christmas concert. To top the weekend off, we had our first real snowfall of the season tonight!

Happy Christmas!

Thanksgiving

We spent Thanksgiving with my oldest brother Matt and his great family in Massachusetts.  It was so wonderful to spend the holiday with family!

Dionne's family has a tradition of celebrating "Pie Night" the eve of Thanksgiving, Dave and I were more than happy to participate in the festivities of eating a delicious variety of pie! We brought a yummy pumpkin swirl cheesecake but there also was pecan, apple, chocolate, pumpkin, and cherry pie (and a few I can't remember!).

Thanksgiving Day was a ton of fun.  We played in the boys' tree house, played piano, ate an amazing Thanksgiving dinner, and played a great round of Scrabble. 

Friday morning Dave and I watched the boys while Matt and Dionne braved the Black Friday crowds to do some Christmas shopping.  Here are all the boys piled on their parents' bed watching cartoons.

Trey pulled out his fun magnet kit and taught us about compasses before Dave and I had to head back home. Thanks for having us in your home Matt and Dionne, we had a wonderful time!